Well the government will get some defect revenue from drivers anyway
If the cars are "unroadworthy", watch out if you drive a VW from now on, because the cops are going to be handing out canaries like cookies!
Oz regulator warns VW: cheatware scandal could cost you millions
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is the latest regulator to put Volkswagen in the cross-hairs, announcing that it's launched an investigation into the beleaguered car-maker. The ACCC has pointed out that the company's “defeat device” cheatware breaches the country's design rules, making the cars unroadworthy …
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Thursday 1st October 2015 03:08 GMT GrumpyOldBloke
Re: Well the government will get some defect revenue from drivers anyway
You can drive your shiny new car out of the showroom and straight to an aftermarket installer who will fit a chip and drain pipe exhaust system that screws up emissions (both fuel and noise). In NSW the part time police force will for the most part ignore you. Would be an interesting situation if the cops started targeting stock VW's (obviously not for the revenue) while leaving the modders alone.
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Thursday 1st October 2015 04:28 GMT John Tserkezis
Re: Well the government will get some defect revenue from drivers anyway
"aftermarket installer who will fit a chip and drain pipe exhaust system that screws up emissions"
After market chips and then programmers were a dime a dozen at one point - they're quite hard to do on "standard" ECUs now. Besides, the chips (if purcharsed from a regular shop) were always legal, they HAD to be. But all they did was take out the flat spots the manufactuer left in, there was very little if any performance enhancements. If you want performance, your only option is to go for an aftermarket (or name brand) ECU replacement, and all of those are designed for racing purposes. The result is legal on the track, but not on the road. And no, I don't know of anyone who's written two maps one for road and track and switch between them. After all, under race conditions no-one worth their salt would leave the cats in.
"in NSW the part time police force will for the most part ignore you."
I don't know which NSW you're referring to, but round my parts, if it sounds loud, or smells "right", they'll order you in over the pits to be tested. Unless you can effect changes quickly, you WILL be fucked over.
"Would be an interesting situation if the cops started targeting stock VW's (obviously not for the revenue) while leaving the modders alone."
I've already replied to someone else on this thread, and it won't happen. You can't blame the owner if the manufacturer won't fix something. If the manufacturer has a fix on offer, especially a recall, and the owner refuses to get it done - that's another story. Policing that though (I had no idea officer) is yet another story again.
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Thursday 1st October 2015 03:51 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Well the government will get some defect revenue from drivers anyway
If the dodgy cars have been sold here and are declared unroadworthy, then I think you can safely say that is a major failure. Take it back to the dealer and ask for a full refund under section 260 of schedule 2 of the COMPETITION AND CONSUMER ACT 2010. Looking at the guide to sellers below, the cars would fail at least 4 of the 9 guarantees that apply to motor vehicles.
Useful links:
ACC guide to motor vehicle sellers:
https://www.accc.gov.au/publications/motor-vehicle-sales-repairs-an-industry-guide-to-the-australian-consumer-law
Schedule 2 of the COMPETITION AND CONSUMER ACT 2010
http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/caca2010265/sch2.html
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Thursday 1st October 2015 04:16 GMT John Tserkezis
Re: Well the government will get some defect revenue from drivers anyway
"If the cars are "unroadworthy", watch out if you drive a VW from now on, because the cops are going to be handing out canaries like cookies!"
They'll probably not. This issue is outside of the owner's control, it's not like they intentionally went out and bought 42 inch wheels and lowered the thing to scrap the tarmac. It'll be nothing more than a "warning" they should go to their dealer to get their cars "repaired".
Regardless of the fact that no-one is geared up for these so called repairs yet anyway.
And I'll say yet again, if the relatively recent DSG fisaco was anything to go by, Australian dealers will plead ignorance unless your car stopped on the freeway and caused a pile-up. To this day, VW Australia flatly refused to issue a recall on affected DSG boxes (vs the rest of the world), instead only servicing the cars who's owners screamed a lot.
Having friends in the industry, it's easy for me to say that if it came to it, I would never, ever, buy a VW - I still had no idea they'd shoot themselves in the foot like this - let alone twice.
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Thursday 1st October 2015 13:13 GMT Francis Vaughan
Meaningless
"it is our understanding that the software is inactive"
¿Que? That is sort of the problem. Or do they mean that the software always ensures that the emissions are low, and never switches to higher performance, dirty mode? One rather doubts it. There is no use case for the software to ever work this way. Either they need to cheat the tests to sell into a market, or the market has lax emission requirements and they don't need to cheat the tests, but still leave the engine in dirty mode.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
